


running out of air

by kimaracretak



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Animal Death, Gen, Horror, Implied Character Death, forests that probably want to eat you, river spirits who are happy to help them eat you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-28
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-12-25 16:49:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18265424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimaracretak/pseuds/kimaracretak
Summary: Tom Bombadil adventures several steps too far





	running out of air

**Author's Note:**

> Setting as Character N44 - underground  
> Legendarium Curiosities O64 - Tom Bombadil  
> Horror O68 - Footsteps and whispers

Tom Bombadil ventures beneath the roots of Old Man Willow on a clear blue day when the Withywindle is rushing quick and loud enough to cover sound of the great tree's snoring. He's always liked a bit of danger, Tom.

Tom Bombadil steps light along the path and his dripping feet leave no trace. His gait rolls slow like a song and the grass beneath his feet joins in, whispers _hush dol, run merry dol_. A little bit of care does not go amiss, from one such as Tom.

Tom Bombadil's mouth does not move as he sings. This is just a little visit, hardly worth being called a journey, and there is no need for that sort of power yet. He has no particular reason for this outing, except, perhaps, it has been quite some time since he has last checked in on the willow tree's slumber, and the hobbits have grown more active as of late.

But first there is the question of Goldberry, who is floating on her back in the curve in the Withywindle beyond which Old Man Willow reigns. She thinks she is safe afloat, clutching a rabbit's haunch against her chest while the fur in her teeth speaks to the joy she has already taken in her meal.

Tom Bombadil has been in these trees much longer than Goldberry, and yet as he watches her bring the bone to her mouth once more, he wonders if it is truly the pretend invincibility of her youth that has her so casual.

"I would not be there if I were you, Gold-berry river-berry," he says, and does not let his song falter.

She sits up, light spilling down her mossy limbs, and she laughs, dark notes to ruin Tom's melody. "You're jealous of my lilies and my rabbits, Old Tom," she says. "Lazy Tom, perhaps you'd have more of your own if you didn't give so many of your words to the troubled willow-tree."

She flicks her hair at him, and for a moment as the water droplets splatter across his chest, it looks remarkably as if his body is leaking blood from the hole where a tree branch has crawled its way straight through his torso.

This is silly, of course, because Tom Bombadil has no blood, no more than Goldberry does. "You will not ruin such a lovely outing," he says crossly. "Tend to your waters, then, and see if they will protect you if Tom Bombadil forgets to sing the old man back to sleep."

"Goldberry is not the one needing protection," she retorts, and swallows the rest of the rabbit whole. "It is old Tom who is going down under the roots and has to walk the whole long way, and my waters that already live down there. Merry dol, you'll soon be crying and you'll not know why because your tears, too, are mine."

She sinks below the Withywindle with not even a ripple to mark her passage in either direction: the river-daughter dissolved once more. The blood, if blood it was, has too dissolved from Tom's bright shirt.

Well, Tom Bombadil thinks with nary a shiver, there was no water to be found in my footprints, and therefore she will not have a way to follow me. She'll make her own way down, for Tom's in a hurry now.

The gaps in Old Man Willow's roots are obligingly hobbit-sized, when he reaches them. The arches of the roots drip unliving water that has never known the sky, and when he sees them, Tom's mood sours even more. "This won't do at all," he says aloud, even as he continues to sing.

Tom Bombadil is not wondering why he is still speaking aloud. He is not yet wondering why he has not opened his mouth to lend his song strength.

He is walking, that is all, and his footsteps are very, very silent in the light of the underground. _Hey dol, merry dol, Tom Bombadil's gone adventuring, down the paths and down the trees we trip merry across the willow-o_ \- but his voice is whisper-thin.

Tom Bombadil does start to wonder, now, about the river outside, and the river down below. It is still quite light, though when he looks back there is only the path, and not a hint of the gaps in the roots through which he had slipped. The walls are quite damp.

 _Hey dol, willow dol_ , Tom Bombadil sings, and waits for Old Man Willow's answering sleepy breath.

It does not come; the walls are still.

"I see how it is, then!" Tom Bombadil crows. "You are sleepy, yes, even sleepier than I last asked you to be! You were expecting no company at all and now I have arrived, it is only fair you pretend to be asleep until such time as I realise my rudeness and trip away, merry dol derry dol and my song at my back."

Tom Bombadil, he is growing quite aware, is talking far too much.

There is a whisper on the air and it is not Tom Bombadil's voice. Nor is it Old Man Willow's voice, the low grumble of earth and the creaking of lightning through leaves and against bark. Nay, this voice is made up of sounds Tom has only heard under much more pleasant circumstances, when he has sat up late with the cottage door ajar and lights twinkling in the window panes as he has watched merry yellow Goldberry adrift on the river.

"Willow dol, will you wake?" Tom asks quietly, and as he looks down at his feet to see where he ought to turn, he sees for the first time, that he has left damp footprints in the dirt.

He hears, for the first time, only water: not even a whisper, not even a song, not even a step.

The water in the walls has become a flood, and Tom Bombadil knows already that to lift his arms against the fall would change nothing. All that is left to do is to wait, as the column of the blue river becomes once more the creature that is no more a woman than Tom is a man.

"Oh Tom Bombadil," Goldberry says with sorrow that, perhaps, she even feels. "We've both been awake for a very long time. I did warn you you had given up far too many of your words; you are no longer merry, no longer going anywhere. Only the sun outside is going down"

There is enough light in the cavern underneath Old Man Willow's heart that Tom Bombadil can see that Goldberry still has rabbit fur in her teeth.

And then he can see nothing else.


End file.
